Maya Iwabuchi LEADER

Zequinha de Abreu (1880-1935)

TICO-TICO NO FUBÁ

FIRST PERFORMANCE 1917 DURATION 5 minutes Carmen Miranda serenaded Groucho Marx with it in the 1947 movie Copacabana. Donald Duck samba’d to it alongside dapper Brazilian parrot José Carioca in Walt Disney’s 1942 animation Saludos Amigos. It’s been recorded by everyone from Charlie Parker to Liberace, Ray Conniff to The Andrews Sisters, and arranged for every conceivable musical group, from rock bands to symphony orchestras. Not bad for a simple tune that’s now more than a century old – but once heard, the infectious syncopations of TicoTico no fubá swiftly get into the brain and under the skin, never to be forgotten.

It was created by the Brazilian composer and bandleader Zequinha de Abreu, one of the country’s best-loved musicians, and strictly speaking it’s conceived as an authentically Brazilian choro, a supposedly sad piece delivered in fast, happy music. Legend has it that the tune was unveiled to an unsuspecting world, as yet untitled, by Abreu’s dance band at a ball in 1917. It sent the jiving couples so crazy that Abreu remarked they looked like sparrows fluttering around cornmeal. When the bandleader asked for suggestions from his musicians for what to call this miraculous new piece, his bassist Artur de Carvalho told him he’d already christened it himself: Tico-Tico no fubá, literally ‘sparrow in the cornmeal’.

The piece wasn’t published until 1930, but then quickly went on to accumulate a wealth of lyrics in Portuguese, English and other languages. Even without words, though – as Abreu originally intended – it’s still got the knack of setting toes tapping and hips swaying, not least when its catchy rhythms and melodies are cast across the kaleidoscopic canvas of a symphony orchestra.

© David Kettle